Play Meter

I ing manufacturers to exhibit working machines, and 2) the nosmoking policy. He added that he thought it would be a bad idea to open up the AMOA show to the general public. "This trade show is not the proper venue for that (promoting the games to the public)," he said. The issue came up when it was mentioned that ACME organizers are considering adding a fourth day to the show for people outside the industry. TECHNOLOGY ANNOUNCEMENT ON HOLD The long-awaited announcement will have to wait some more The AMOA advanced technology committee has been working on a hush-hush project for over two years, and top AMOA brass were confident that the details had been sufficiently ironed out to make a formal announcement at the expo. But at the AMOA business meeting on Oct. 22, outgoing president Craig Johnson relayed the sad news : there would be no news. If the announcement is made in time this month, we'll have details in the December issue. MIDWAY / BALLY DOMINATE GAME AWARDS It was a sweep reminiscent of "Cheers" and its Emmy Award domination. At the 1992-93 Game Awards, held in conjunction with the Jukebox Awards at AMOA Expo '93, Midway /Bally won Most Played Dedicated Video Game (NBA JAM), Most Played Conversion Kit (Mort.al Kombat), and Most Played Pinball Game (The Addams Family, for the second straight year). Congratulations to everyone associated with these awardwinning games. Other manufacturers honored at the awards ceremony were Sega, Arachnid, Valley, Rowe, Grayhound, and Dynamo. The top Jukebox Award winners were Eric Clapton and Whitney Houston. Look for a full listing of the categories and winners next month. NEWS BULLETIN Arts, Kaufman said, ''We're looking at what platforms we want to write software to. It's no secret that we're involved in supporting the 3DQ hardware, and there's no question that it will be a platform in the coin-op area, not only for Electronic Arts but for other companies. "There will be a lot of news in technology over the next two to three years, and I'd like to believe that Electronic Arts will be on the cutting edge of it. The company has made an emotional statement and a financial statement to the industry: we're a player and we expect to be very good at what we do." In a related story, Konami's Frank Pellegrini confirmed at the AMOA show that he is leaving the company and will be joining Kaufman at Electronic Arts. We'll have more details on Pellegrini's duties in the next issue. JUKEBOX INDUSTRY JOINS THE CLAMPETTS Music from "The Beverly Hillbillies" movie is being promoted at thousands of jukebox locations nationwide via a promotion with AMOA, jukebox operators, Fox Records, and RCA Records. Being promoted is the film's soundtrack on CD and two 45 rpm vinyl releases created specifically for the jukebox industry. . The soundtrack features Lorrie Morgan, Aaron Tippin, Joe Diffie, Ricky Van Shelton, The Oak Ridge Boys, the Texas Tornados, Sammy Kershaw, Joe Walsh and Steve Earle, and Ricky Skaggs. Coordinating the package are Sterling Title Strip and Sam Atchley, AMOA's record label liaison. For more information, contact AMOA at (800) YES-AMOA. AMOA TAKES POSITION ON ISSUES IFPA SETS TOURNEY DATES At the previously mentioned business meeting, AMOA members voted to accept policy statements made by the association with regard to three issues : violence in video games, the safety of video games, and revenue-sharing. In the violence statement, AMOA urges video game manufacturers to be responsible and cognizant of the adverse effect too-violent games can have on the industry. This and the other two statements will be printed in their entirety next month. (Note: We'll have much more coverage of the AMOA showproduct listings, photos, game picks, seminar and banquet coverage, awards, etc.-in next month's issue. Due to deadline restrictions, we were only able to touch on the show in the "News Bulletin" section.) The fourth annual AMOA-International Flipper Pinball Association World Pinball Championships will take place April 22-24, 1994, at the Clarion Hotel in Chicago (near O'Hare) . For more information, contact Doug Young, AMOA-IFPA, P.O. Box 442, Muskego, WI 53150-0442. The phone and FAX numbers are (414) 422-0000 and (414) 422-0707. ACE, ACME MERGER NEAR As we went to press, merchandise suppliers Ace Novelty and ACME Premium Supply were close to having completed a merger ; minor points in the deal still need to be worked out. We'll have more details as they become available. STONE, BARONE TO SEGA Two familiar industry names, Al Stone and John Barone, have been hired by Sega USA. Stone served as executive vice president of coin-op operations at Nintendo America before the company got out of coin-op in mid-1992. Barone resigned his position as SNK's senior vice president of sales in September. We'll have more information on their new duties at Sega in the next issue. KAUFMAN SETTLES IN A few months ago it was announced that Steve Kaufman was joining Electronic Arts to head up its newly formed coin-op division. We wondered how things were going so far. "Fine, just the usual pains that one goes through when starting a brand new venture," said Kaufman, who's general manager. "We're in the initial phases of product development in San Mateo, Calif. Games are being programmed at the moment, but it'll be at least six to eight months before we introduce them to the marketplace." As to the type of games we can expect from Electronic PLAY METER 5 MORTAL KOMBAT TO BECOME MULTIMEDIA EVENT Midway Mfg. Co. has engaged the services of producer Larry Kasanoff and Danny Simon's The Licensing Group to help seek deals for a Mort.al Kombat feature film, TV series, and fullblown merchandising product line. The coin-op mega-hit made history on "Mortal Monday" (Sept.13) by becoming the industry's biggest home video game launch ever, with sales exceeding 2.2 million units. "We've created unique characters through this game that have reached extraordinary levels of popularity,'' said Roger Sharpe, Midway's director of marketing. "We have chosen Simon and Kasanoff to help us bring these characters to their respective media because we share the same vision of what Mort.al Kombat is now and what it can become." CANADIAN COMPANY BUSTED FOR COPY VIOLATIONS Robert Rose, doing business as Ten-0-Four Limited in Ontario, Canada, appeared recently in Barrie Provincial Court and entered a plea of guilty to five counts of selling or offering for sale infringing copies of a work in which a copyright sµbsists. He was fined $1,000 per count. Earlier this year, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police serviced a search warrant at Ten-0-Four Limited and another at Rose's residence. Fifty-three suspected counterfeit printed circuit boards were seized at the business. Both Rose and Ten-0Four Limited were subsequently charged with violating the Canadian Copyright Act. During service of the search warrants, a number of the counterfeit boards were found to be undergoing repair, having been sent by customers in the United States. In addition, other counterfeit boards were packed and awaiting shipment to the United States. Other leads are being explored by the U.S. Customs Service and AAMA. NOVEMBER 1993 •